Hyperbole

Here are some reasons (by no means an exhaustive list):

• The city is very green
That's the color green. It's very wooded, lots of beautiful green trees everywhere you look. It really is gorgeous
• The city is very Green
That's the green state-of-mind. The city seems has as strong pro-environment and sustainability bent to it. It's not perfect, of course – apparently the city had a Boulder-like anti-development ordinance in the past that it has since relaxed. But the city is truly innovating in this area; I heard on the radio just this week that the City of Portland is moving to 100% renewable energy starting next year. It was also selected as the nation's most sustainable city. Some of my other points support this as well.
• Effective Public Transportation
We were in Portland for ten days, the first five I was attending the conference, the last five was just vacation. We rented a car for only two of those days, ostensibly so we could drive to the coast. The rest of the time we either walked where we wanted to go or took the MAX light rail train. Most of the places we went by car the one day we had it in town were easily accessible by bus as well (though I suspect a bus is a little harder to navigate with a stroller – we never folded up the stroller for a MAX trip.)
• History and charm
The downtown area has lots of beautiful and well-kept old buildings (some older than any I've seen here in Los Angeles.) Much of the neighborhoods in the city core (or at least, on the East side, where I drove around) were very charming, lots of beautiful old homes. Not many for sale though...seems folks are sticking around.
• Affordable housing
This isn't really fair of me actually. I work in Los Angeles, earn Los Angeles pay, so housing in Portland seems far more affordable than Los Angeles. (I don't live in Los Angeles because it's too expensive: but Portland is still cheaper than the Los Angeles suburb I live in.) We looked at houses on a hill overlooking the city (Northeast, not West, for those of you who know the city) and they were priced within our reach.

I could go on, maybe I'll add more later. Needless to say, if it were no impediments to our doing so, we'd be preparing our move right now. But that isn't in the cards right now... we're going to stay put for awhile.